Phil is Thankful For You. Yes, You.

Hello, hello to all my readers out there. Both of you. Or the one of you that probably stuck around after my absence. Anyhow, today was pretty cool. They FINALLY let us get our hands on Pro-Tools. The lab work sucked, but it was nice to just sit down in front of the software that is likely going to dominate the next several-dozen years of my life. It really is a pretty good program, but it's ugly as sin and hurts the eyes. You'd think that their team of engineers would have done something about that by now. Oh well. I have to learn every nook and cranny of that SOB for certification, which is later this month. A few weeks ago at the panel discussion I mentioned in a previous post, Bruce Swedien made a joke about getting his dog a Pro-Tools certification. I seriously can't let the dog beat me to it.

On an unrelated note, Thanksgiving was fun. Played a LOT of Rock Band with some old coworkers from GoDaddy and got a better feel for playing the drums in the game. It's hard, to say the least. Even more so after a few beers. Also, my host was going through the world's most ridiculous diet, so eating big meals in front of him was amusing.

Also, I am never cooking again. I managed to ruin noodles. NOODLES! Seriously, I retire from food.

More later, I'm busy ripping some new CDs.

Happy Thanksgiving, You Damn Heathens

Well folks, just wanted to let you know we'll be on a temporary hiatus while I'm in Arizona. Apparently there's a "no blogging" policy at the house I'm staying in, or something like that. At any rate, I expect to be far too inebriated to write anything worth reading if I DO manage to sneak a few minutes online. So have a great holiday, and I'll be back on Monday!

Bonus Post: Victory Dance!

I am #1 in the world!!!


(until tomorrow morning, probably)

That's two lab practicals aced, one to go. Also, one lecture exam down and one more tomorrow. Then it's peace, I'm out to Arizona!

I picked up Rock Band tonight and it's pretty awesome. At the very least the track least kicks Guitar Hero 3's ass up and down, and the promise of being able to play a toy drum set is like liquid crack in a syringe made of candy. Or something just as nonsensically awesome.

That's all you get tonight. I'm exhausted from plastic toy guitars. Peace!

Damn You, Army of Lawyers

Well, my friend Johnny played another gig tonight. Which I slept through. Go me, passing out at 7:30 pm! And staying up extremely late as a result! I'm the man!

This just happened, also. A rant detailing his experience with trying to cancel a week-old online subscription to a broken video game. I did a little digging up the on the Terms of Service and realized that I should probably read those things that I just check OK on all the time. Seriously, the consumer is totally screwed. See my forum post in response to the article(under the clever handle Phildo) for some examples of how the contract screws you.


After writing that last paragraph, I took some time to look up some contracts that I've signed myself for online service and the like. They're all equally ironclad as far as customer satisfaction goes. "Not happy with our service? Quit. We already go your money, haha!" Needless to say, I don't think I'll be signing any more of those.

Now I'm going to go to sleep angry. Thanks a lot, army of lawyers!

Do Sheep Dream of Wooly Robots?

Every week or so I have to go through the harrowing ordeal that is the call to my grandmother. Oh sure, it starts out nice enough with something like "did you get the money I sent" or "I'm glad to hear you're doing well in school." But invariably it degenerates to (at least) ten minutes of lecture on how I could improve my life. For those of you that know the woman, you're aware of what she's like and for the rest of you I'll mercifully spare the details. But, really, I had to go through it tonight and so I felt like mentioning something.

I got to spend some more quality time with those games I bought the other day. They're growing on me, but I'm waiting for the "wow" moment. Apparently, I impulse-bought the wrong ones. So I spent more time playing vintage games and talking to people online than I did playing the expensive new ones. Par for the course with me. Buy expensive toy, play for a few hours, forget all about it in favor of some old game I beat 10-15 years ago.

Really though, I just want to get my tests over with and ship out to Arizona. I have my first lab practical tomorrow on the SSL 9000J. Beast of a console, one of the major industry standards. And also completely ass-backwards signal flow compared to everything else we're working on. At least it's out of the way first.

No YouTube link today, I'm feeling lazy. Instead, I'll leave you with some practical advice. Don't forget to bus your effects returns to the stereo mix.

Poooooost

Hi again, everybody! School's been treating us to some excellent guest-speakers lately. Today we got to talk to 83 year-old jazz legend Sam Rivers. Sam has played with some of the biggest names in jazz, including Miles Davis and Herbie Hancock. The dude is cool, and he can still wail. He played last night with his big band, but I'm sad to say I missed the performance. Well, there's always next month.

I bought some new games today on impulse. I need to stop doing that. Seriously. Assassin's Creed is as disappointing as I was afraid it was going to be. At least Conan is fun, sorta. Like God of War with, um, Conan.

Here's a video for you, in lieu of original content.



Also, while I was writing this, I was having an IM conversation with some girl that found me on an online dating site. Our conversation was going well until I asked her what sort of books she reads. She responded with 'Oh, I don't." I was a little shocked, but I simply responded with "Oh, that's a shame." Her reply? "I don't think we should talk." I got dissed by a girl because I asked her what kind of books she reads. What. The. Hell. Ponder that for a while.